Watering and transport devices for plants of the kind which are used, for example, for delivering and storing potted and garden plants in garden centers and similar sales outlets are known from, for example, DE 20213719. When devices of this kind are being transported (back) empty, the problem regularly arises as to how the numerous storage platforms on which the plants had been standing during shipment can now be housed in as compact and space-saving an arrangement as possible on the base platform or on the frame struts so that the best possible use is made of the available cargo space in the delivery vehicles used for this purpose, and so that this process can be conducted in as short a time as possible.
Conventionally, the method adopted for this is that the individual storage platforms are hung one on top of the other in the frame struts in as densely packed an arrangement as possible, i.e. so that a storage platform is hung in the insertion recesses of each individual level. This is very time-consuming and does not make the best possible use of the space which would actually be available in the vertical direction.
It is known per se from DE 28 00 575 C2 to insert the frame struts into the support sockets in a transport position, in which their longitudinal slots are facing each other, or inwards, i.e. in a position which is rotated by 180° compared to the storage position. In this position, a number of storage platforms can be stacked one after the other on the base platform from above, and it is no longer necessary to hang the insertion end portions in the insertion recesses, since they instead extend into/through the longitudinal slots and are received in a hollow space inside the frame struts. This leads to a saving of labor time both in creating the transport position (storage platforms are stacked on the base platform) and in the reverse procedure, in which the individual storage platforms have to be removed and are again hung in frame struts mounted on a base platform, which have of course previously been inserted the other way round or are located in the storage position. Nevertheless, this stacking method has never been used in practice, because the mounting members on the bottom storage platform in each case had to bear the entire weight of all the stacked storage platforms and could not take the load.
The invention is based on the object of making an improvement here and providing a watering and transport device for plants in which the storage platforms can be arranged for transport purposes more quickly and more closely packed than hitherto, and without the risk of damage.